The Dungeon Master's Betting Hall

Hello everyone!

I thought I'd do a bit of a preview post about The Dungeon Master's Betting Hall! This was a new location voted into the game last month that I've been working on busily for the past two weeks or so. This isn't the only thing getting added to the game this month, but... it's quite a big thing, so!

I wanted to do a post to flesh everything out that's coming and set everyone's expectations and such. There will be some very light spoilers in this poll, probably, so... if you want to be completely surprised by everything coming at the end of this month, skip this post!

The Location

Here's the definitely not final version of the bit of 'art' that'll be hanging out in the background of the scene. As you can see, the Dungeon Master's Betting Hall is less of a hall and more a... market stall. There's a good reason for this, though! The Betting Hall is a travelling show. A travelling show that's normally held on a stage or even inside of an amphitheater, but... Hellev has neither of these things. The only space available to rent was a dinky market stall in the corner of the town square. The showrunner (a crow named Ygraine) isn't super happy about this, but... she'll only be in Hellev for a week or so according to plan, so, she'll get used to it.

The first thing you'll notice is the dungeon, probably, but... cast eyes toward that big purple orb first! What does this do? Well, the audience can watch the show through the dungeon's open top design... or, alternatively, they can watch from the micro's point of view by staring through the crystal. The micro has a collar around their neck, you see - one that has the arcane equivalent of a camera upon it. This means that even if they're somewhere in the maze that they can't easily be seen - like digesting inside of a monster's guts, for example - the audience will still be able to keep track of them.

Now, about that dungeon you can see! It's a maze - a minotaur's labyrinth sort of design, specifically. How does it work? Well...

The Game

Much like the stall, this is definitely a concept rather than the final product. I'm probably going to redesign the maze slightly before the end of the month... or I might not. I'm not sure! The concept and how it works won't change, though, so...

... anyway. There are four treasures in the maze. Patrons will bet on how many treasures the micro will pick up - betting from zero to four to complete victory. Zero is unlikely given that the micro start right next to one, but... there's always that slim chance the dumb little guy'll walk into a monster's mouth before managing to find anything. Four is extremely unlikely given the sheer amount of traps and hungry beasties in the maze, but...

... if the micro manages to collect all four, then they must make it to the center of the maze. There, they'll find a tower - and, inside of it, they'll find themselves in a final battle against a beast. If they win this battle, then... the micro lives to dungeon run another day! And if they don't, well... that's the expected and preferred result, really.

It's unlikely that the micro will collect all four treasures, though, much less make it all the way to the tower.

How will this work in-game? Well, it's actually going to be very fun - and kinda neat! A combination of player interaction and pure luck will influence the result. The micro might collect one treasure - they might collect two - or three - or four - or even make it to the tower for the final battle! This is all based on choices that you get given as the show moves on as well as a few dice rolls behind the scenes. The result is a little random as a result, but... you are placing a bet, right? Would be silly if the outcome was the same every time! How many outcomes will there be? I'm not sure yet. At least five!

You'll also be able to suggest your pocket elf play the game. You won't be able to bet if this is the case, but... you do get a free game and a slight bonus if she wins, so... it's not all a loss. Plus, there's different outcomes if you use her! She's pretty strong, after all... maybe she can even win!

The majority of the outcomes are going to be oral vore related (to make most use of the purple PoV orb) but there's also going to be one or two endings of a different variety.

Since the outcomes might be hard to get due to RNG and such, I'll likely make it so that you can just view them separately in the Patreon Options. Maybe! Depends on how it ends up working on the back end of things.

Anyway! That's the stall, and that's the game, so... let's finish up with the people who are there.

Ygraine & Takayuki

Here's some stuff about the two people running the stall! They have lots of dialogue. It's mostly about the world outside of Hellev and their travels within it. I wanted these characters to do some primo world building, basically! Don't worry, though, you don't have to talk to them about anything... and you can just play the game and move along if you like! But, if you're chatty, you'll find that there's lots to discover with these two.

Ygraine (a female raven) is the showrunner of The Dungeon Master's Betting Hall. She's a tall sleek bird that lacks any form of fancy marking or excessive plumage, but... she makes up for that in her manner of speaking. She's a fast-talking deal-making story-telling bird that's more than happy to wax lyrical with you until the sun comes up - providing you're a paying customer, anyway. She hails from Gulniste - one of the cities close to Hellev itself, though... she's been around the world more than once. She's 45 years of age exactly, but she might tell you that she's 35 instead. Then again, Ygraine lies about more than her age, so...

Takayuki (a male fruit bat) is Ygraine's assistant - and husband! He's a short, skinny, fluffy, and handsome. Unlike Ygraine, he's less focused on talking fast or making deals or telling extravagant stories, but... that doesn't mean that he doesn't talk. He's just more concerned with sharing facts and accurate tales from his travels than bombastic stories that (probably) didn't happen. He comes from the very distant continent of Iyari - or, the Farlands - which is the so-called birthplace of magic. He'll be happy to tell you all about that... as well as some other stories, like the time that he came face to face with a leviathan - or a sea dragon. He's a very seasoned 22 years of age.

Clint & Tia

Clint and Tia will be the patrons at the Betting Hall! You've met them in the tavern as a micro already, but... how about meeting them as macro? The two of them are on a 'date' - or something resembling one, anyway - so they're not going to want to talk to you too much, but... they do have some dialogue. Not as much as Ygraine and Takayuki - but that's kind of the point. Unlike Ygraine (who wants you to spend money at her stall) and Takayuki (who is just a nice guy) they don't really want to talk to you.

That's it! I just wanted to tease out a bit of information since I've been working on this area a lot of over the past week or two and I'm really excited about it! I ended up working on this all day Friday instead of finishing off Fox Pizza as planned, so... sorry about the delay on that! I'm going to finish it today and likely get it uploaded either late tonight or early tomorrow. Taking a day off was worth it, though - it gave me chance to let my ideas breathe and now the last portion of the story is super spicy.

I'm now going to post the second round of the alchemist's species poll. See you in a few seconds!